Running In The Family
by Scribbler
Summary: [one shot] Pietro talks to the only thing that will listen about a difficult decision he has to make. Set right after HeX Factor.


ObNit - This is a repost, as last time this ficlet was caught in the upheaval of FF.net's new systems, and subsequently all reviews were erased. Sigh.  
  
DISCLAIMER: Still not mine - though not for want of trying.  
  
AUTHOR'S NOTES: And this is why Scribbler should never sit down in front of a computer when she has no inspiration. Apologies for this one, but I was reading through Amicitia's rundown of 'HeX Factor' and it struck me. I've been trying to stir my stumps writing-wise, and I have done anything in first-person for a while, so this was the result. Like I said, many apologies. It's set towards the end of Season Two, even though I haven't seen that far, and even though the episode is over a year old now. I laugh in the face of continuity! No prizes for guessing who's who herein, either. Title comes from song of the same name by Level 42. The lyrics just seemed to fit.   
  
'Our dad  
  
Would send us to our room  
  
He'd be the voice of doom  
  
He said that we would thank him later'  
  
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'Running In The Family' By Scribbler  
  
June 2003  
  
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What can I say to make you stop hating me?  
  
You know, it's funny the hand that life sometimes deals you. I never once considered having to ask you that question.   
  
Stop you hating me.  
  
Perhaps a better one would be to ask *why* you hate me in the first place. You were never entirely clear on that. Granted, I'm not the best person in the universe. I won't win any prizes for my soppiness, and my sensitivity pretty much lives in the doldrums these days, but I don't think I ever really contemplated being hated before. Not just disliked, but really, truly, properly hated.  
  
Oh yeah, there was that thing with Daniels. Big whoop. But that was nothing really. A friendship, and then a rivalry for a while, until we both kind of wondered what we were rivalling about.   
  
See, we've both been stood on the sidelines at other guys' rivalry-grudge-match-thingies, and generally they fight *over* something. Be it girl, male pride, an insult thrown in the halls - whatever. Guys *do* that kind of stuff, but they always do it for a reason. Daniels and me, we just never really had that. Catch me if you can on a basketball court was about as in depth as our 'grudge match' originally went, until I got bored and cranked up the volume a little. You know I never do things by halves, and that time was no exception. Brought in the police and everything, the whole kit and caboodle.   
  
Meh, it was interesting for a while, I'll admit, watching Daniels squirm. But then, afterwards, the whole thing just lost its appeal. 'Catch me if you can' isn't really so much fun when you can only chase your own tail.  
  
Jeez, listen to me babble. Talk about maudlin. Talking to the wall is so much easier than talking to actual people. If I'd tried this with you, no doubt I'd have been blasted half way to Calcutta by now.   
  
Which brings me back to what I was saying. Why do you...? I mean, what did I...? Damn, this is harder than it looks. Maybe I should just go for a run, clear out all this emotion crap from my system. Usually does the trick when I need de-stressing.  
  
Except I've already been for a run. Several, in fact. Didn't help one iota. You know why? Because no matter how far I go, or how fast I can make my feet move, I've only really got the one place to come back to, and that's where you're at. That's where you're not waiting for me, not looking at me, and not acknowledging me. I could set myself on fire and run into your bedroom and you probably wouldn't even look up.   
  
Do I really mean that little to you now?  
  
Augh, I need to do something to take my mind off this. Something constructive... or destructive. Whatever floats. That's what Fred does, and he swears by it. Get stressed, go punch something. Be the fist, as it were.   
  
Yeah, like that'd work for me. Punching is not, as they say, my forte. I once trip to hit Daniels, and it came out like a frikkin' bitch slap! Ooh, yeah, very manly, I'm sure. No, my speed's always what I've used to get the better of people. Guess I'm kind of dependent on it now, huh? I can't run - whammo! I'm out of whatever fight we're in, no better than a flat-scan.  
  
But speed's not doing me any good right now. Yet another thing I never thought I'd find myself saying.   
  
I can usually solve any problem by throwing something at it - money or my power being the top two. But this... this... *thing* with you is different. You're not interested in cash, and you're not interested in me, or what my abilities can do for you. You just don't care. You don't care about gain, you don't care about wealth, and you don't care about me.  
  
Which is why I'm ranting and trying to explain myself to a brick wall - Jesus H., how low have I sunk?  
  
Thing. I guess that's really the only way to describe what we have now. It's not a relationship; it's not even a rivalry. It's just a thing. I come home, and there you are. You go past, and there I am. We don't talk, we don't touch...  
  
I don't usually like touching. My power again. I'm so speeded up that *everything*, even the world around me is practically in slow motion. You don't know the half of it anymore. It wasn't so bad when you left. Fits and starts. Now it's all the time, all day, every day. It took me months of learning just to decipher what people were saying when my abilities first started to really kick in. They all just sounded like a slur, like when you slow down a CD and the singer sounds like they're talking through a mouthful of treacle. I had to re-learn how to listen, how to understand what was going on around me, and how to speak and be understood by everyone going at normal speed. Not so good when you add in my small attention span.  
  
Touching changed after that, too. I couldn't... I started to feel trapped whenever I made contact with people. A tap on the shoulder lasted a full five minutes to me, a brush in the hallway was like being clung onto by a Pitbull, and as for hugging... well, let's just say I'm not as tactile as I was when we were kids.  
  
When we were kids. Remember that? I mean before... it happened. When things were still nice, and we were normal. No powers - nothing. Just us. I used to love hugging then, though you weren't so keen on it. Used to call me soppy, as I recall, and said I wasn't being a proper boy. Boys were tough, strong, and didn't like cuddles or suchlike.   
  
It's funny, I thought I'd grown out of the whole cuddling phase. But now... now, here's something you'd *really* want to blast me for saying. I want to hug you like I used to, to remind myself you're really real, that you're really there and not some delusional dream my overactive imagination dredged up.   
  
Ha! Like I need anymore proof after what Boss Lady showed us? What *you* showed us at the Mall, even.  
  
Maybe I should just hit my head against this wall for a while. Bash some sense into myself. If I knock myself out I won't have to ponder over all this crap. Hell, this is like having a song go around and around inside my brain non-stop.   
  
What am I supposed to do when you won't tell me what I've done wrong?   
  
I was a little kid; hardly the stuff heroes are made of. What did you want me to do, go after you into that place? Chase you...  
  
I've been chasing you ever since you came back, but you keep ignoring me, throwing the odd cryptic comment my way like you can sum up your entire argument with a sentence and a meaningful look. Well let me tell you something - I'm not a mind reader! I can't tell what you're implying that way. I need you to actually *tell* me, to spell it out in so many words. Pretend I'm an idiot and explain it to me. Just... tell me *why*!  
  
Why do you hate me? I told you it wasn't my fault. I can understand why you hate him, but me? What did I do?  
  
What didn't I do?  
  
Or is it you just hate me because you can't get to him?   
  
Huh, hate by proxy. Faboo.  
  
I wonder what you'd say if you knew what he asked me the other day? Truth be told, I never actually believed he was dead. If I was feeling malicious, I'd say he was like a cockroach. Still, he never got in contact with me since the incident up on Asteroid M, so I figured he wasn't interested in what I had to offer anymore. Hey, I was cool with that. So he abandoned me. Twice. Like I cared?  
  
Shit, I sound like somebody in a self-help group. Hi, my name is so-and-so, and I was abandoned by a parent.   
  
That head-bashing idea is looking mighty appealing right now.   
  
Maybe that's what sparked off this whole psychoanalysis episode. The phone call, not the head bashing, I mean. I'm supposed to make this decision about his new team without telling a soul, and usually I'd be fine with that, but... but then *you* turn up and throw a complete spanner in the works. I'd all but decided to take him up on his offer, and leave. But now I find myself wanting to stay, and irony of ironies, the person I want to stay for couldn't care less if I jumped in a vat of acid.  
  
What a headfuck. I hate mind games. I want to stay. I want to leave. I want to know how to make you stop hating me. I want to join the team that'll probably make eradicating you and the others its number one objective. What the hell kind of a decision is that to make? If I'm not on the giving end, I'll be on the receiving. There *is* no in between with him. No nice little purgatory I can sit in and watch without getting involved.  
  
But you know that already, don't you. You learned that long before I did.  
  
What the hell am I doing? Not to sound cheesy, but talk is cheap. It doesn't solve anything. You just have to look at that Xavier dude to see that. He talks big, but when push comes to shove, his X-Geeks have to fight to make their point. I never see much gabbing when they're kicking Brotherhood butt. Well, unless Summers et al are telling Lance to quit with the dumb rock puns.   
  
Which way am I supposed to go? What am I supposed to do about you, him - the whole frikkin' planet were supposed to be ruling?   
  
Why the hell is the world grey instead of simple black and white?  
  
Sorry, wall. You've been a great listener, but this is getting me nowhere. I've got to go home sometime, and putting it off doesn't make it any easier. Maybe she'll be in her room when I get in. I can hope, right? I mean, if I don't see her, I don't have to think about her.  
  
Of course, if that were the case, I wouldn't be here, doing this right now, would I? Practising words I've never actually going to say.   
  
Like why? And what can I do to make her stop hating me? And which side of the line am I supposed to jump?  
  
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FINIS.  
  
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End file.
